Will Barrett is playing golf when he falls down and, on falling, realizes that something is wrong with him. After his fall, Will begins to see things in nature that remind him of events in his past, and he begins to contemplate suicide. He knows that he is depressed, but he cannot determine if his depression is a disease making him illogical or if he has, in fact, accurately determined that the world is farcical and absurd to live in. If more people became depressed, he wonders, would suicide begin to seem like a more rational choice?

During a golf game in North Carolina with a friend, Dr. Vance Battle, Will collapses again and suddenly relives a memory of his childhood in Mississippi. His experience is not diagnosed as a hallucination, but rather as the sudden recall of a memory that he had previously forgotten. He remembers walking through an unincorporated lot on a shortcut home and seeing Ethel Rosenblum at cheerleading practice. On admiring her beautiful body, he falls down, overwhelmed with desire for her. He and Ethel are both very intelligent, but they do not often interact at school. Will imagines settling down with her in the unincorporated lot, thinking that it is the only place where a Jew and a Gentile (non-Jewish person) could be together.